In advanced civilizations the period loosely called Alexandrian is usually associated with flexible morals, perfunctory religion, populist standards and cosmopolitan tastes, feminism, exotic cults, and the rapid turnover of high and low fads—in short, a falling away (which is all that decadence means) from the strictness of traditional rules, embodied in character and inforced from within. — Jacques Barzun

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I have argued that our politics is essentially a battle between Locke and Rousseau. Yesterday’s election was one of the most directly philosophical that I can remember. The Republican Party is increasingly the party of Locke; the Democratic Party, the party of Rousseau. Framed that starkly, Locke wins almost everywhere except the coasts and areas that are heavily populated by minority voters.

Michael J. Totten interviews Martin Kramer about the prospect of a nuclear Iran. It’s a deep discussion of the entire situation in the Middle East; read it all. Kramer concentrates especially on the division between problems in the Levant (Israel, Lebanon, Syria) and problems in and around the Persian Gulf. The conclusion:

Martin Kramer: It’s absolutely central to the strategy to maintain this division. And the only way to maintain it is for the United States to demonstrate tomorrow that it will not allow Iran to acquire nuclear weapons or to allow Israel to act unilaterally. The Gulf is a zone of American dominance, and the only way to assert that is to do what Carter did with the Carter Doctrine, when the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan. He said there should be no outside power or local power that is allowed to challenge the United States in the Gulf. And a nuclear Iran clearly crosses that line.

If even Jimmy Carter was compelled to issue a doctrinal statement in the wake of the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan about the Persian Gulf, one would think that Barack Obama would see the need to do something similar. Obama should especially feel compelled to do so because there’s a question mark there. He should declare the Persian Gulf a nuclear-free zone. It’s too much to talk about the Middle East as a nuclear-free zone at this time, but the Persian Gulf is nuclear-free now, and it’s time for the United States to come out and say it should remain nuclear-free.

MJT: I have a hard time imaging Obama doing anything of the sort.

Martin Kramer: Yeah. Well.

MJT: But I suppose one never knows.

Martin Kramer: It would be an astonishing lapse if a man who promised to roll back nuclear proliferation watched proliferation develop in one of the least stable parts of the world, a place where the United States has only been able to maintain even a modicum of stability by a massive projection of its own forces. The region is of prime interest to the entire world for its energy resources. If it becomes nuclearized, it will be the one thing for which Barack Obama would always be remembered by history, and he would be remembered by history as a failure.

Well, now that I no longer work for NPR let me give you my opinion. This is an outrageous violation of journalistic standards and ethics by management that has no use for a diversity of opinion, ideas or a diversity of staff (I was the only black male on the air). This is evidence of one-party rule and one sided thinking at NPR that leads to enforced ideology, speech and writing. It leads to people, especially journalists, being sent to the gulag for raising the wrong questions and displaying independence of thought.

Daniel Schorr, my fellow NPR commentator who died earlier this year, used to talk about the initial shock of finding himself on President Nixon’s enemies list. I can only imagine Dan’s revulsion to realize that today NPR treats a journalist who has worked for them for ten years with less regard, less respect for the value of independence of thought and embrace of real debate across political lines, than Nixon ever displayed.

I went to college with Juan Williams, and, though I disagree with him on many issues, I’ve always found him to be intellectually honest, open-minded, and willing to engage in real debate and discussion. Most commentary on the left seems to consist mostly of name-calling and straw man fallacies; Williams shows respect for his opponents and their opinions even when he disagrees with them. That, of course, is part of what got him fired.

Roger Simon suggests that Congress pass a “Juan Williams law,” prohibiting all government funding or bailouts for any news organization operating domestically. I think that’s an excellent idea. I’ve argued against funding for NPR for years. What justification has there ever been for having a government-funded news organization? It’s especially important now, for as one of Roger’s commenters points out, “we do not need to pay for the privilege of being lied to, lied about and destroyed from within.”

Some further thoughts:

Bill O’Reilly told Juan on his show last night that this is good for him; he’ll get a fat book contract to write about what you can and can’t say in America. Undoubtedly true. Fox News has already offered him a $2 million, 3-year deal.

Bill also told him that he’s now far more popular than he was a day before. Also true. Most air travelers have had a thought similar to the one he reported at some point since 9/11; they now realize that the arrows of political correctness are pointed at them.

The CEO of NPR in effect called Juan crazy. That was foolish, making her look crazy and vindictive and opening up a new avenue of legal liability.

Once again we see that leftists are far more intolerant than conservatives. Michael Barone observes, “An interesting contrast: while many NPR listeners apparently could not stomach that Williams also appeared on Fox News. But it doesn’t seem that any perceptible number of Fox News viewers had any complaints that Williams also worked for NPR. The Fox audience seems to be more tolerant of diversity than the NPR audience.” Roger Ailes: “Juan has been a staunch defender of liberal viewpoints since his tenure began at Fox News in 1997. He’s an honest man whose freedom of speech is protected by Fox News on a daily basis.”

We also see that leftists can’t think clearly. The standard line seems to be that Williams said that all Muslims are terrorists. But obviously he said no such thing. He reported his own feelings. He also said he regretted them. But all it takes to make his feelings rational is some correlation, in general or at an airport, between being a Muslim and being a terrorist. Leftists look foolish when they deny that there is such a correlation. And don’t forget the recent terror alert asking travelers to be on the watch for Mumbai-style attacks!

Some liberal web sites have been distributing a purported bill for an average taxpayer, asking, “What part do you not want to pay for?” They’re implying that the Tea Parties are making a fuss about nothing, that the tab for government services is quite reasonable. The bill is meretricious, using 2007 data, taking a family that owes only $5,000 in taxes, and then showing items that add up to far less.

I thought it might be interesting to see what the federal government has spent in fiscal 2010 for an average family of four. I took total spending, divided by the population of the United States to get per capita numbers, and then multiplied by four to get a bill for government services for a family of four. Amounts are rounded to the nearest dollar. The list is incomplete; the items don’t add up to the total precisely.

Steel yourself. I was shocked by these numbers. Keep in mind that they’re only federal spending; state and local governments, combined, spend almost as much.

This is what the federal government spent, apportioned to an average family of four:

Social Security

$10,027

National defense

9,313

Medicare

5,920

Medicaid

4,341

Welfare

3,705

Unemployment

2,516

Interest

2,432

Veterans

1,615

Transportation

1,379

Education K-12

1,089

Housing assistance

997

Mortgage assistance

721

Education, general

680

Foreign aid

534

Medical research

482

Agriculture

430

General government

396

Police

373

Community development

369

Environmental protection

311

Higher education

264

Basic research

241

Courts

238

Energy

199

Water supply

161

Foreign military aid

128

Prisons

100

Public health

57

Recreation

52

Total

$48,180

That’s just about the median family income. It gives a new relevance to this joke about tax simplification:

UPDATE: Add in state and local government spending and the tab comes to over $80,000!

The Left’s One Nation Rally in Washington was getting more airplay on CNN and MSNBC than Glenn Beck’s rally did, despite its smaller size. (CBS estimates 87,000; Beck’s rally drew many times that. Stations were driven to use images from the Beck rally and the Tea Party to make it look as if the crowd was large!) I wonder whether CPUSA members, and members of similar socialist groups, really believe that they reflect the true face of America. John Hinderaker sums it up:

Two comments on today’s “One Nation Working Together” event in Washington:

1) Four hundred organizations, including all the major labor unions, the NAACP, the Sierra Club, Code Pink, the Green Party, the Communist Party, the United Methodist Church, Planned Parenthood and hundreds more were not able to turn out as many people as Glenn Beck.

2) One of the stated purposes of the gathering was to protest against lack of civility in public discourse. The program was opened by Ed Schultz.

The Left may be in even more disarray than we thought.

UPDATE: Here’s an estimate of 50,000, 6-8 times smaller than the Beck rally. (HT: Instapundit.)

That’s what one commenter has said after viewing the video released in support of the 10:10 initiative, and international effort to get people to cut their carbon emissions 10%. My thoughts exactly. I thought I was watching a heavy-handed spoof of the totalitarian impulses behind the environmental movement. And then I realized that it wasn’t a spoof. Good grief.

My campus was locked down, and then closed, this morning when a gunman began firing shots. He entered the library, where all the security is designed to keep things from leaving inappropriately, went to the sixth floor (early reports said the fifth floor), and shot himself. The university’s warning system, instituted after the Virginia Tech shootings, helped to insure that there were no other injuries. I received a text message telling me there was an armed person in the vicinity of the library within minutes. I was not on campus, but my daughter was heading in to take a math exam. She got off the bus to find a small tank going down the street, helicopters circling overhead, and a woman in a green dress telling everyone that campus was locked down and directing them not to cross the street onto campus. My daughter couldn’t go to class, and couldn’t get home—the northbound bus stop was on the campus side of the street—so I drove in and took her to breakfast. People in my building waited for several hours. A SWAT team frisked them and took them to a classroom, where they stayed for two hours until a search of the building was completed. A friend of my daughter’s was on the sixth floor of the library this morning, and had to stay there for more than 6 hours.

A friend was teaching an early morning class, and reports:

[I] was lecturing on the ‘Crito’, justice, political obligation, civil disobedience and the unimportance of death; with what I thought was admirable Socratic sang-froid, I carried on and finished the lecture. Not sure many of them were paying much attention – at any rate to me. I had to change some of the examples (about coercion) rather rapidly as well.

I suppose that doesn’t say anything very good about the relevance of philosophy—or at least of the ideas of Socrates.

One notable feature of this morning’s experiences: My daughter had rapid access to an amazing amount of information about what was happening. She and I were both receiving the university’s emergency text messages. She could also receive the emergency emails. But she also began receiving text messages from students all over campus—some in class, some in their dorms, some at their university jobs, and some in the library. She had real-time information coming from sources all over the campus. Radio stations also did a great job—KLBJ-AM did an especially outstanding job—but social media beat out traditional media for those with a rich social network. For the rest of us—well, my phone sat there silently. But I heard everything from her.